Apple CEO Tim Cook thinks learning coding is more important than English, but there is a problem

Apple CEO Tim Cook recently told a French media outlet that if he was a 10 year old boy in a French school today, it would be more important to learn to code than to learn English. No matter how good his intent is, there is a fundamental flaw in his advice

Here's why: main(i){scanf("%d",&i);puts("dispari"+3*(~i&1));}

The above combination of gibberish characters is not a printing error or a cryptic message. It is a 'C language' code to determine if a number is odd or even. Like C, Java, Apple's Swift and numerous other programming languages are nothing more than a combination of English characters used along with numerals and mathematical operators; Programming languages are not mystic hieroglyphs. They are just English written in a particular format to instruct computers.

Cook continues to say that through coding, one can express themselves to 7 billion people in the world (read as build mobile apps). He goes on to mention Apple's programming language 'Swift' in the interview and why it is important that everyone must learn it. But he is mistaken in his understanding of how languages divide people when it comes to accessing technology, let alone people learning to code and make a living out of it.

Lack of English knowledge (not same as illiteracy) creates an uneven playing field when it comes to using technology that can improve people's lives. This is because nearly 50% of the gargantuan web is made up of English and the second spot is held by Russian at a distant 6.6% and French occupies a minuscule 4.1% and ranks 6th in the pecking order. These numbers are fundamental indicators how the web is skewed by English, and the problem accentuates further around computer programming.

When it comes to coding, every leading programming language in the world warrants that the programmer is adept in English. Good programmers know that coding is not a rudimentary exercise of clanking keys on a keyboard that magically churns out software and mobile applications. It all starts with logical thinking and then methodically coding, in English words of course, that instructs the computer to do what it's told.

We don't need any more Fart Apps:These are Apple's own words to developers in 2010 urging them not to build amateur stuff. Back then there was less than 3 lakh apps on the App Store. The app space has only become crowded with over 2.7 million apps in 2017. This means, for Cook's dream to come true, programmers can't dole out lame attempts at apps, but build some serious, useful products, which means they need to learn great programming which is built on English!

Great programming can't be learnt with just text books and chalk board in a classroom. Even veteran programmers refer online forums, borrow libraries created by peers, a testament to this culture is the numbers on StackOverflow.com, a Q&A forum for programmers. It has seen 13 million questions and 21 million answers on programming and technology. All of these are in English.

Professional grade programming includes everything from addressing hygiene issues, adding comments on source code, to ruthlessly following good practices like naming the concatenating variables in Pascal format (first letter caps like HotFridayTalks) to astutely securing the source codes from external vulnerabilities by classifying the classes and variables 'private' and not public by avoiding hard coding strings and so on.

Whether by default or by a cruel irony of design, today, the world of programming is largely dependent on English. More than mere advice, we need leaders like Cook to act on ways to outgrow the dependency on English for growing and democratizing technology.

Several people ET spoke with about Ericsson’s India operations, including its current and former employees, said the Stockholm-based firm has reduced headcount in the last one year or so across functions, in line with its global restructuring.